Spear phishing emails

[Mum38383]

edit: Good grief, should be spear phishing emails.

I found two similar emails in my spam, sent in quick succession, that on the face of it looked like from family members that I have very little contact with by email - they sent suspicious links to photos. When I checked the email addresses they were clearly wrong and the emails were spear phishing

How do phishers know the two names? Both are people I haven’t emailed in years. Who’s side is compromised, theirs (both of them at the same time?) or mine?

It's possible that they have been hacked , let them know if you can but use a different way to communicate

I just had a look in my spam and I've had one too - "Couldn't help but feel a little sentimental when I saw those three photos. Actually meant to send them a little sooner". With a link that I'm not clicking.

They'll either have been hacked or something has gotten into their contacts. Luckily gmail knew it was spam. Also I never get emails from this person. I might let them know though.

Edit - actually although the name is someone I know (very generic name line Peter Smith) the email address isn't, so presumably just using generic names to send? Not clear!

One of the names used for me wasn’t generic. But yes sounds very similar to the emails I got. (Which were also worded and titled differently.)